


Leg: the Leggening

by katty_tpose



Category: Original Work
Genre: "sally" however does!, Gen, Slushies, Written for a Challenge, does not accurately reflect my current writing style, except it was with emojis, hunger games-based original work, kids being kids thrown into a death game, pretty much only posting this so i can have it saved somewhere else as a backup, the other character used (asteria) does NOT belong to me, whether that makes it better or not is up to you, wrote this over a year ago, yes "leg: the leggening" is seriously what i called it when i originally wrote it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:33:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27506152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katty_tpose/pseuds/katty_tpose
Summary: From pins to games to bloodshed to slushies, two girls fight the world and each other.
Relationships: Original Character(s) & Original Character(s)





	Leg: the Leggening

**Author's Note:**

> just to make sure i have a backup for this work (i originally posted it on a private Amino), i'm posting this here too. i wrote this back in september of 2019, soo it's pretty crusty. 
> 
> it was for a writing challenge in a FNaF-based writing group i was (and still am!!!) in, where everyone was partnered with someone else to write a battle-royale-ish story with your character and your partner's character. i was partnered with a lovely person named Spring and her character "Asteria", and with my character Sally, this story of these two was born. :]
> 
> looking back on it over a year later, i'm actually still decently satisfied with it. my writing style has changed a bit, for the better i hope, and yet i still see myself in every bit of the writing here, so distinctly "2019 me". i kinda like it. you might, too.

The hallway, while it looked luxurious with its beautifully carved wooden walls and pristine flooring, was cold and almost unwelcoming to the blonde girl. She shivered as she walked through the hallway with the older man who led her through with a firm grip on her hand. Paintings of (probably important, she mused) people decorated the walls — if she didn't know any better, she'd have thought they were staring at her with those cold gazes.

The walk through it felt like it was taking an eternity and a half, but at the same time felt all too quick as the exit to the hallway came into view. She likened it to prison bars.

The blonde shivered again and looked up at the older man, eyes conveying dread and fear — mouthing a "please don't". Instead of humoring her wish, he simply mouthed back "good luck" and handed her a pin. It looked like it was made of gold, kind of like her hair, she thought. It was in the shape of a star.

He looked at her expectantly, which she took as less of a sign of delaying the inevitability of opening the metal gate and more of an "attach the pin to your shirt already, where else do you think it's supposed to go?"

Carefully, she clipped it to her shirt. The man subsequently pulled a lever — up went the gate. "I hope I'll see you again after this. May the odds ever be in your favor," he said in that raspy voice of his as he patted her on the shoulder and gestured to outside of the hallway. She nodded and took it as a sign to go.

She sure wished she'd be able to see him again, considering the other possibility wa—

_"— And it looks like Player 1 has entered the arena!"_

She winced at the intensity of the voice. Whoever was the announcer must've been having fun, she supposed.

_"Let's all give a warm welcome to... Sally!"_

And the crowd cheered. So many people had taken the seats surrounding the arena, it might've made her head dizzy if she weren't already anticipating (and dreading) it.

_"And Player 2 has entered the arena as well! Let's give a warm welcome to..."_

Oh, right. Her opponent. She'd heard her opponent was around the same age and the same gender, too. At least it'd be a somewhat leveled fight.

_"Asteria!"_

More cheering followed — she couldn't tell whether she or her opponent (Asteria, she has a name, so use it, she inwardly chastised herself) had more people cheering. She sort of wished she were able to see Asteria amidst the overwhelmingly massive arena filled to the absolute brim with forestry and grass almost reaching up to her hips. At the same time, though, it meant that the arena was big enough for her to hide in if she needed to.

_"The fight will commence in 5 minutes! In the meantime, Players 1 and 2 are allowed to use this time as a grace period to get accustomed to the arena!"_

Good. That sounded like enough time, she guessed.

_"After the 5 minutes are up, anything goes! If any physical violence takes place during these 5 minutes, then the attacker/attackers will be penalized. Good? Great!"_

At least that meant she had time to enjoy her last few minutes of peace.

_"Your 5 minutes starts... NOW!"_

* * *

5 minutes left.

As bushes shredded with every onslaught of daggers aimed, leaves flew through the air and crunched under Asteria's footsteps. She was sure that if she didn't have her mouth masked, she'd have swallowed half of the leaves she'd been trekking through by now — even while she was walking. She was surprised they hadn't already pricked her eyes out by now, how they flurried around. She was starting to get the idea that slicing through everything in her path as quickly as possible wasn't the best idea she's ever had.

Thankfully, though, several trees scattered around came into view — some of which had vines. She grinned under her mask; if she were careful in her aim, she'd probably be able to grapple onto the trees and swing from the vines to get closer to the middle of the arena, since she sure as hell wasn't staying around just to get blinded from thick bushes and leaves threatening to scratch her eyes at any second.

Aiming at the tree's branch carefully, she fired the hook from her launcher.

* * *

4 minutes left.

The air felt heavy and moist and smelled like pine needles — it was hard to see clearly with the misty fog that just started permeating throughout the air (which she guessed was a consequence of the "grace period" starting). Tall, wet grass covered nearly every inch of the part of the arena Sally was trying to navigate. On one hand, it'd make for easy hiding — the downside was that if she were caught here, she might as well have been a dead man walking.

A tree, surrounded by thick bushes, made its way into her view as the fog seemed to dissipate with each step she took towards the first sign of actual forestry. Gripping the trunk of the tree with one hand, she set her sights on coming it and gaining ground.

* * *

3 minutes left.

The vines that Asteria had been relying on to navigate through the trees had quickly cut short, she realized as she'd been gripping on to a branch that just barely held her weight. Apparently, nature had decided not to favor her this time around.

She weighed her options carefully; on one hand, she could continue navigating the forest via the trees and their branches and vines and thick leaves that made getting caught from below unlikely (she'd always favored higher ground), but consequently made finding her opponent harder if they were below as well (she'd also always favored knowing where her opponents actually were).

Alternatively, she could fall into the river below her and possibly die.

Apparently, her failing grip on the tree branch had decidedly gone with the second option.

* * *

2 minutes left.

The water splashed as two long, purple ribbons gripped onto the ledge of a rock. Grunting, Sally pulled herself up with said ribbons, coughing up the excess water in her system from the river. She shivered, but quickly attempted to ignore it in favor of continuing onwar—

Rustling. Her opponent was nearby, weren't they? Probably looking for her, considering it didn't sound like they were trying to conceal themself at all.

Sally's eyes darted between the bushes and grass behind her and the river she'd just pulled herself out of, her hands shaking. With one final glance at the river, she'd decidedly made up her mind.

* * *

1 minute left.

Instead of making the same mistake of simply slicing through each bunch of grass and bushes with armies of daggers and making it damn near impossible to see anything other than leaves hitting too close to her eyes, Asteria had taken the (frustratingly slow) trek through them instead. The lack of trees in this area of the arena was stupid in her eyes, but whatever, at least her opponent didn't have high ground either — weren't they supposed to be some short girl or something?

She froze, hearing rustling that was definitely not her own — they were nearby. But then, it stopped, for the most part at least. Were they trying to hide...?

Her thoughts were cut short as she finally made it out of the tall grass and bushes (for the most part; easily avoidable bunches of shorter grass were strewn around, but she didn't pay them much mind) and found a river that was... oddly discolored. A sickly purple instead of what should've been blue.

She stepped closer to the river, meaning to inspect it (because this was WAY too abnormal to not give second thoughts on) when she heard a rustle and footsteps.

She snapped her head around, realizing her opponent was meaning to ambush her, and got a good look at just who they were...

Shit.

* * *

_"Time's up!"_

Sally grinned.

_"The fight has officially commenced!"_

She made her first move at her opponent — Asteria. She ran and whipped her ribbons at her while she seemed to be in a state of shock, surprise, disgust? Whatever, she thought, doesn't matter. She didn't seem to hit her target, though, and before she had the time to even think about attacking again, she felt a kick to her leg and almost buckled. She backed away immediately after, however, and gave a quick glance to Asteria, who mimicked her temporary retreat.

She took advantage of Asteria's withdrawal and pounded her ribbons at her boots. She'd have grinned if it weren't for her lack of seeming to have done any damage to her — she felt the air kicked out of her, which she quickly realized was from the blow to her stomach. Furrowing her brows in a glare, she did one last attack to her — this time, aiming at her less impenetrable stomach — and took the moment of respite for her to roll away from Asteria's vantage and to the river.

She glanced at Asteria, who seemed to have recovered from the blow enough to fight her again. She narrowly dodged the hook that came out of the thing on Asteria's arm (she likened it to a grappling hook, and added that to her mental strategy list), but at the cost of dunking herself into the river again.

On the upside, Asteria probably wouldn't be able to do much damage to her from there, unless she were to try and join her herself — and it seemed the venom she'd injected into the river wore off, so at least she wouldn't die from her own attack.

On the downside, she couldn't remember the last time she'd ever taken a swimming class, which would probably mean imminent death by drowning soon if she didn't get out.

Just as she latched her ribbons on to the ledge of the rocks surrounding the side of the river she was on, she felt the water sway and splash as if something heavy were being thrown in. She didn't spare a glance at just what (or who) ended up getting thrown in, as she hurriedly pulled herself out of the water.

Turns out, Sally realized, she didn't escape just fast enough, as she felt her arm go numb...

She glanced at Asteria with wide eyes, refusing to look at her arm any longer. She realized it was Asteria who'd gone into the water with her, as she stayed afloat in the river. She looked... apologetic as she looked at the damage done to her arm, but she wasn't planning on staying around long enough to see the end of her pity as she ran as fast as possible into the forestry of the arena, not daring to turn around for the whole run.

* * *

Sally shivered as she sat against the trunk of the tree. As the adrenaline wore off, and she remembered just why knife wounds hurt like hell, she'd bandaged her arm with her jacket to stop the blood like she'd remembered being taught to do.

Figuring that her arm must've been fine by now (her current definition of "fine" being "enough to function — probably"), she fiddled with her jacket and wore it properly, hoping that her moment of respite would last enough to recover her stamina.

Or not.

She heard the crunching of leaves nearby, no doubt coming from Asteria. Eyes wide and darting around the entire area to try and pinpoint where she was, a hook (the same one that came from the thing on Asteria's arm, she realized) whizzed just past her. She unintentionally let out a small gasp — inwardly cursing at herself for alerting her whereabouts to her — before jumping to action and running again.

Unfortunately for her, she wasn't fast enough to miss seeing the daggers thrown at her direction from her far right. She defended against the daggers getting dangerously close to reaching her with her ribbons, letting them fall to the grass one by one.

The daggers that missed, however, ended up cutting through the bushes and grass behind her — less hiding room for Asteria, she figured.

As she was getting ready to deflect another onslaught of daggers, she stumbled in surprise when she heard something heavy landing behind her — realizing that Asteria slicing through the bushes behind her was likely more intentional than she thought.

She snapped her head around to find Asteria only a few feet behind her. Immediately, she grabbed her arm with both of her ribbons, injecting venom into her. She felt what probably had been daggers clumsily aimed at her (a few dangerously close to hitting their target), inwardly sighing in relief that luck seemed to be on her side.

Or not, as her leg stung with pain. She stumbled backward, her ribbons' grips on Asteria weakening. She looked down and realized it was that same damn hook from her arm thing that ended up having jabbed her leg. She was glad she wore jeans long and thick enough to soften the blow a little (and obviously prevent it from plunging into her leg and bleeding), but hell did it hurt and throw her off balance.

Asteria mimicked her stumble backward, looking sick in the stomach — no doubt from the venom. Instead of falling down and staying down like Sally really wished she would do already, however, she persevered and flung even more daggers. (At that point, she had the fleeting thought of "how many goddamn daggers does she HAVE?")

Sally focused her attention towards deflecting as many of the daggers as she could (perhaps even try to catch one to use herself), thinking nothing of the poisoned girl in front of her.

Unfortunately for her, that meant missing Asteria's last-second escape, which she only noticed too little too late when the announcer she definitely didn't miss in the slightest came back on (because how could she forget that this was still all just a game);

_"And it looks like Asteria is ready to make the finishing blow!"_

Sally looked back and sputtered out, "Where– what finishing mo—?" searching the entire area for a few short seconds until she heard the sound of something heavy plummetting—

She jumped out of the way of what she'd belatedly realized was a tree branch large enough to have been able to end her then and there. She saw Asteria backed away behind a tree (the same one she ripped the branch off of, no doubt), surprise evident in her eyes from seeing her still standing (limping, really, but specifics were far from either girls' concerns).

"How did you—?"

Asteria's question was quickly cut short when Sally took advantage of her moment of shock to run towards her and jab her face with one of her ribbons.

And that was that. Asteria collapsed (she was still breathing, Sally noted), coughing up what was likely blood, judging from the crimson staining of the mask covering her mouth.

This was her chance. Cheers from the audience goading her to finish her finish her finish her rang in her ears, yet they sounded all too far away and alien.

_"And in a sudden turnaround, Sally has survived, while Asteria has fallen!"_

Biting her tongue, Sally prepared to finish the job, win the game, and go home...

Another cough came from Asteria, who opened her eyes just enough to meet Sally's. She attempted a sort of shrug (at least, what Sally assumed to be a shrug) while lying down, but it didn't achieve the effect she looked like she wanted to go for.

Sally took a step back and glanced around. Sucking in a breath, she tentatively reached a hand out to Asteria. The announcer definitely commented on it, no doubt, but she hardly paid it any attention.

Asteria raised an eyebrow and gave her what she interpreted as a "what are you doing already?" look. In response, she shook her head and used her other hand to gesture behind herself;

"Let's get out of this stupid place."

* * *

Metal bars clattered to the ground. Its impact was almost impossible to hear, however, above the yells of tens of thousands of people from their seats lining the damned arena.

Not that it would matter any longer, anyway. The two girls ran into the hallway, not daring to look back for even a second.

They were free. For now, at least, but hell if they weren't gonna enjoy it.

"We should get slushies! They can probably help with your whole coughing-up-blood thing from earlier — uh, sorry, by the way."

Asteria almost snorted, taking off the mask that she wore over her mouth. She quickly waved the shorter girl off. "Sure. And apology accepted." After a beat, she added, "Oh, and sorry for your arm wound, bleeding sucks."

"Psh! No way, don't be sorry. I have a badass battle scar that I can brag about, now!"

They both shared a laugh at that. "So, anyway, what flavor slushie do you wanna get?" Sally asked.

"Something vanilla—"

"Nuh-uh, you're not getting anything vanilla — that's boring!"

"Let me be boring."

"Part of being friends is looking out for you — refusing to encourage you to buy anything with 'vanilla' in its name is looking out for you."

Asteria chuckled. "Yeah, thanks. Don't know what I'd do without you."

Sally returned her chuckle with a lopsided grin. "You'd be getting a bad slushie flavor."

**Author's Note:**

> so, one thing i think i did genuinely good with was the action. short, though not too short, so it gets the point across quickly. i maybe could've used some more harsh "action words", but otherwise i think i did good considering it was a first attempt and i'm not much of an action writer at all. you can also see in some parts of me beginning to learn how to do scenic writing, with the beginning scene and certain lines where a character is hiding. this was recently long, clocking in at nearly 3000 words, and considering i've only recently started being able to write longer stuff surpassing 3k, that was surprising and kinda cool. there's very little filler scenes or description from what i've read, just some one off lines that could've been edited out. i also completely forgot about the minute countdowns in the beginning, those actually really surprised me, i like them a LOT! so, good effort, 2019 katty. 
> 
> of course, some stuff i can't help but criticize lol. the ending where sally and asteria escape the game and the building felt extremely rushed (and generally lazy) and didn't have much of an explanation at all. i think it was weird that i decided for sally to almost win and then be the one to spare asteria, current-me would've written it to be the other way around (because seriously, an 11-year-old beating an 18-year-old, especially considering their personalities and strategies? well okay i guess lol). when i said "beginning to learn", i really meant that, and it shows LOL, simplest way i can say it is that i would've written them (imo) much better ahah. sally's reaction in the beginning vs during the game regarding being forced to murder others felt like a weird dissonance, could've portrayed her to be a bit more sick with/disgusted by it considering the turnaround of her sparing asteria in the finale bit. 
> 
> there's a bunch of other shit i can nitpick about it, but i don't think you came for that, did you? feel free to nitpick yourself, i take zero offense. :]


End file.
